Emilio - 10 months

Emilio - 10 months



Emi, you are 10 months now! Incredible how little you have left before your first birthday!

It has been an incredible month, filled with a little bit of everything. LOTS of teething!! There is drool everywhere, and unfortunately your sleep hasn't been great at all. That, paired with a lot of sickness being brought home by your big brother, has made nights a living hell for this mama. But now you seem to have passed both the sickness and teething phase ( for now)  and you are sleeping beautifully. I think in the last 2 nights you have only been up once and back to sleep.

Speaking of sleep. I think you are starting to need your own space, because when you wake up and touch me in your sleep you start complaining and kicking and pushing me... It will be interesting to see what our next sleeping arrangement will be, but I keep reminding myself I will not worry about that until you are at least a year old.

Another thing waiting until after a year is to see what will happen to breastfeeding. At the moment you are still nursing about 5 or 6 times during the day and a couple (?) of times at night. You are sooo interested in your brother's bottle, that it almost makes me want to pump just so I can give you your own. You are always distracted and if it is not quiet and still, it is really hard to nurse you. Sometimes I think you wouldn't care much if we dropped some sessions. But then sometimes you do enjoy the cuddles and I can tell sometimes you just need the comfort and security. But like I said, I will divert any related thoughts until after a year. Sofar I am just glad we have made it this far.

Other things you can do now:

- crawl SUPER fast

- say mama more consistently, and you are definitely immitating more sounds. I think you try to say Paulo and papa but you just say "ba!"

- climb the stairs UP and DOWN, the latter being new

- climb off the bed, feet first

- climb shelves :s

- drink from a sippy cup with help

- YOU CAN CLAP!! Which is super cute

- you dance to music and I think you try to sing along

- you can sit, with your feet tucked under your bum

- play alone for long periods

- " walk" while holding on to somebody's hands or furniture

- the cutest thing is when you crawl close to daddy or Paulo and throw yourself on the ground yelling "AAhhh!" because you want to "wrestle" hahaha.

Emilio, you are still the cutest baby and all smiles. We love you chiquitino!

My Baby Book List

What does a mother do when she needs to raise a baby in a new city, away from her mother, her family or any close friends known to her? She reads books. And that is what I did when I had Paulo and with him came all those questions that keep a mother awake at night and eat her alive during the day.

Ideally, I think I should have read these books before I had my babies. Some parents seem to have it together and know what kind of parent they will be or what kind of parenting philosophy will guide them through thick and thin. I didn't. I had no clue there were even parenting philosophies. I thought parenting was parenting and that was it. Oh boy was I ever wrong.

From the list I came up with below, one can see that I found my comfort in Attachment Parenting. These books below are not all the books I've read, but they are those that resonated with me and made a lot of sense. And through those books I sort of navigated my way to all the others. Now I find that these are sort of my rocks, my solid foundations. Have a look:

The Baby Sleep Book - Dr. William Sears - pretty much Im a fan of Dr. sears, just become Attachment Parenting resonates so much with me and who better to learn from that a man with all the professional experience, plus, lots of kids and a wonderful family to back the theory. I loved the Sleep Book though because in a world ( or society?) where there is so much pressure to let baby cary-it-out like its the only way and to become a detached parent, and a world which is filled by books written by quacks with no real research or data to back their advice, this book sounded so non-judgemental to me and at peace with my feelings as a mother and baby. Simply loved it.

The Fussy Baby Book - Dr. William Sears - similar as the above, except this one I found very useful

when I had Paulo, because he seemed to be so high needs.

The No Cry Sleep Solution, Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night - Elizabeth Pantley    - Excellent read, I think self described as a compromise between Dr. sears's " martyr" approach and something different. Not crying it out. At the time it felt like it didn't ally offer me a solution to a baby who never slept through the night, but looking back I think Pantley does offer some good, gently, baby friendly tips.

Diaper Free: The Gentle Wisdom of Natural Infant Hygiene - Ingrid Bauer - this book was my

BIBLE for Elimination Communication. I cant say how much I loved this book. It is written very clearly, uses examples, describes the process step by step. It is just an excellent book for people interested in EC.

The Happiest Toddler on the Block- Dr. Harvey Karp - i enjoyed this book and definitely gave me

some useful pointers and information. More than anything, i loved the leads I got for other gat books from its resources. It is also a very gently book that really urges you to be patient and understand how a toddler's mind works. It felt to me that a lot of this advice sort of comes from personality- clearly he is very good with kids and I feel like it could be hard to mimic that, but nonetheless a great resource.

Our Babies, Ourselves: How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent- Meredith F. Small - this is by far, THE BEST, AWESOMEST, MOST INTERESTING, FASCINATING book I've ever read. It is not a how-to book, and my husband even called it "obscure" and "ivory tower". And it does talk a lot about the science behind babies behaviour and development, from evolution to biology to anthropology. There is a lot of talk about primates and species and cultures around the world and how they raise their babies and why. But that's what I loved about this book. Even though it is not meant to teach parents how to parent, through scientific facts it becomes very obvious that western parents are for the most part...well... Screwing up big time. If you are considering letting your baby cry it out, feeding him on schedule, putting him to sleep alone in his own room, after reading this book you would have to be either really ignorant, really selfish, or I dont know what to still do it. And although it is all based on science, it is very easy to read and just captivating.

Sleeping with Your Baby: A Parent's Guide to Cosleeping - Dr. James J. McKenna is the world's most knowledgeable sleep guru. He is the head of a mother-and-baby sleep research facility in Montreal, which makes him pretty much an authority in the baby sleep department..ummm quite literally. So, if you are going to read a book about baby sleep, why not read a book that contains the actual truth about what is best for baby?? Don't read something just because it makes you feel better about using a method that makes you feel like you are doing something wrong or you are being mean to your baby. If you feel like you are doing something wrong or bad to your baby, chances are, you are. So, read this and people who work with this man. And forget what the rest of the world (including you mom!) says.

Beyond The Sling - Mayim Bialik PHD - This book just blew my mind. It is centered around Attachment Parenting and portrays what the life of one Attached Parent looks like. Now, I know Mayim has sadly gotten divorced recently, and this kind of puts a huge question mark on this book. That's not to say we should question Attachment Parenting, in my opinion. A parenting philosophy itself does not make people get divorced. And divorce issue aside, I still respect Mayim Bialik immensely for being an amazing example of somebody who "walks the talk" on all aspects of her life. Anyway, I think what she writes in this book of course, like any other book written by someone who's intimate life we don't really know, should be taken with a grain of salt. But I reiterate, in my opinion, this book is good stuff.

Baby-Led Weaning: The Essential Guide to Introducing Solid Foods - and Helping Your Baby to Grow Up a Happy and Confident Eater -  Tracey Murkett, Gill Rapley - This book is about a different feeding method for introducing your baby to solid, alternative to the typical purees that we are all used to. I am just going to say two things: First, this book makes sense because it is what many people in the world do, or used to do when we didn't have any blenders, Nestle rice cereal and baby magic bullet. Second: I tried the traditional method with my first son, and this method with my second son. My Second son at 9 months old is such an amazing independent eater it is not even funny. Having basically the same diet, it is amazing how much Emilio LOVES food with a passion, and how much he enjoys sitting down to eat. And I mean, Paulo was a great eater and still eats pretty well. But the difference is incredible in terms of what a better eater Emilio is.

 

 

And that is all sofar, I still have some great books in my future list, so I hope I will be writing about those soon!

Emilio - 9 months

 

 

Emilio, you are 9 months today! Every month it has felt so surreal that you are whatever age you are, and this month is no exception -- time has flown by!!

 

 

 

This month however, it feels like you have all of a sudden become a super baby over night. You have gained unbelievable speed and confidence in your crawling. You cruise holding on to furniture more and more often. You climbed up one whole flight of stairs at an unreal speed, and then down. You have started to coo in more coordinated syllables, and Im even suspicious you may have started to say " hola" and maybe even " no,no no" ( you say " na, na, na" but always in the same context, when you are annoyed or upset"). There is a very obvious sudden fascination with all things tiny, which leads me to think there might be some visual milestone around this age, because all of a sudden you focus on the tiniest things, and therefore have perfected your pincer grip. This is great when you eat, since now you can eat things such as grapes, rice and cut up carrots and peas on your own. The downside to that though is that you find the littlest pieces of who-knows-what in the carpet and take them right into your mouth. You have also started to sit up completely unassisted with your feet bent under your bum.  And the mother of all milestones of the month, today I saw you stand on your two feet alone, while distracted grabbing a fork from the dishwasher door with your two hands. You stood for maybe about 5 second without even noticing, and then held on to the door again.

We have now mastered the poop in the potty now, and you haven't gone poo in your diaper  except for once in the entire month ( the first morning your Abuis arrived from Mexico and she was looking after you) . I am really pumped not to be washing any poopy diapers anymore!!!

Another great thing this month was that I ordered a Little Frog woven wrap from Poland this month. I still use the Maya ring sling a lot, but you have become pretty heavy and you had really outgrown a

comfortable carry for several months now, and that was destroying my back. I had been looking for an affordable wrap when I read about Little Frog. So since I got the wrap I have been wrapping you in a ruck carry every day, first with the help of your Abuis and now I have definitely gotten better at it. It has been a huge success. You look very comfortable and happy in it, and for me it is a world of difference to carry you on my back. The most amazing thing? You fall asleep within 10 minutes max if it is time for you to nap. I just go about my business while wearing you and bam, you're out!

 

 

Some of your favourite things this month:

- playing/ fighting with your brother

- Eating - you just go NUTS over food

- baths

- Itsy bitsy spider ( you now try to follow with your hands)

- emptying the cutlery from the dishwasher

- getting wrapped

- climbing stairs

- turning the TV on and off

Things you hate:

- the car seat

- getting your diaper changes/ lying on your back

I can't wait to see what awaits us this month!